Updated: Shannon Mum on Hamilton At Meeting

The most vocal critical of Republican Del. Phil Hamilton -- by far -- has been his Democratic House colleague Steve Shannon. Shannon, who is running for attorney general, was the first to call for Hamilton's resignation, is airing radio ads about him and talks about him frequently on the stump.

But yesterday Shannon attended a House Appropriations meeting, alongside Hamilton, and had a chance to publicly call into question whether Hamilton should continue to serve on the House's most powerful committee -- and he said nothing.

It was the first committee meeting since the release of emails showing that Hamilton worked to get a job with Old Dominion University while securing state money for the school. He is under federal investigation.

Democratic leaders who do not serve on appropriations -- Ward Armstrong and Ken Plum --sent out a statement calling for House Speaker Bill Howell to remove Hamilton from the committee.

But not a single Democrat said a word about Hamilton at the meeting. They even stood by while Hamilton, who serves as vice chairman, briefly presided over the meeting while the chairman stepped out of the room.

Updated: Shannon's campaign responds. "A committee hearing is not the appropriate place to raise allegations against another member, no matter how serious or well-founded they may be. Del. Shannon hopes that the Speaker will act on this matter before the committee's next hearing."

By the way, in case you were wondering, Shannon's opponent Ken Cuccinelli has called on Hamilton to be removed from the committee as well.

Of course they said nothing, Ms. Kumar. Do you think they should be shouting "you lie" in the chamber of the oldest legislative body in the Americas?
No, thank you for your journalistic implication, but there is no reason to bring up the issue on the floor in the committee meeting. If the GOP caucus is not going to handle the issue properly, what good is bringing the decorum on the floor down going to do? This entire post is ridiculous. They have business to get done while in session, and were right to leave the politics out of the chamber and let the chips fall--they've all said their piece and rehashing it in committee will accomplish nothing while breaching decorum.

If Cuccinelli has called for his removal from the committee, why is Cuccinelli the only statewide candidate who has not called for him to resign from the General Assembly? I agree that a public meeting such as this, where the taxpayers' business is supposed to be conducted, is not the place nor the time for Shannon to have brought up Hamilton's behavior.